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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 6:53:36 GMT
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 6:54:25 GMT
Brooks Brothers RiotMaddow & Scarborough: Two Views Of The 'Brooks Brothers Riot' Of 2000 (HQ)2000 presidential election between George W. Bush and Al Gore was one of the closest in US history, ultimately decided at the Supreme Court. The day after the election, neither candidate had reached the magic number of 270 electoral votes needed to win, since the vote tally in Florida was too close to call. Bush maintained a lead of 1,784 votes on election night but a mandatory recount narrowed his lead to just a few hundred votes. Then, Gore’s campaign used a provision in Florida law to request that several counties perform a manual recount. It was against this backdrop that a miniature riot helped shut down the recount.
On November 18, 2000, the Miami-Dade County election department was furiously sifting through piles of votes by hand in order to meet the Florida Supreme Court’s deadline. In response, the Republican Party used its national infrastructure to organize a protest with the goal of shutting down the recount. Hundreds of angry protesters showed up at the election office, shouting and pounding on the glass doors of the building. Election officials stopped the public recount and continued their work in a small room out of public view. It was this move that triggered what would become known as the Brooks Brothers Riot, named after the line of conservative business wear stereotypically associated with the Republican establishment.
The protesters, some of whom were later identified as staff members of Republican Congressmen, entered the building and beat on the door where the recount was taking place, with some officials claiming they were shoved or hit when they tried to speak to the protesters. The disorder contributed to the county election board’s decision to stop the recount. The whole issue became moot a few weeks later, when the US Supreme Court ruled that Florida’s recount violated the Equal Protection Clause and ordered an immediate halt, which in effect delivered Bush the election. As for those protesters at the county election department, many later went on to land positions in the Bush administration.
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:14:02 GMT
DebategateJimmy Carter, Ronald ReaganWe have another presidential debate and another dirty trick that may have tipped the outcome of an election. In 1980, President Jimmy Carter was fighting for reelection against former California Governor Ronald Reagan. By late 1980, Carter had recovered from devastatingly low approval ratings caused by his handling of the Iran Hostage Crisis and was running neck-and-neck with Reagan. Carter repeatedly refused his opponent’s requests for a debate, leading to Regan pointedly debating a third-party candidate instead. But Carter finally relented, and the only debate between the candidates was set to take place exactly one week before the election.
The Carter campaign was busy preparing when it received a shock—a copy of the campaign’s debate prep book outlining the president’s strategy and talking points had been stolen from the White House and delivered to Reagan’s campaign headquarters. During the subsequent debate, Reagan handled himself ably, delivering several witty rejoinders to Carter’s attacks, while Carter fumbled a question about nuclear arms. Reagan pulled ahead of Carter after the debate and went on to win the election in a landslide. As for Carter, he still feels that the theft of his debate prep book contributed to his loss that November.
The controversy surrounding the theft, which became known as “Debategate,” did not end with the election. The FBI opened an investigation to find the culprit, while a Congressional subcommittee conducted a separate investigation into the matter. The strongest suspect at the time was Reagan’s campaign manager, Bill Casey, who went on to lead the CIA during the 1980s, but neither the FBI nor the Congressional subcommittee were ever able to identify the thief.
A more recent theory contends that Paul Corbin, a Democratic strategist and close friend of the Kennedy family, was behind the theft. According to this theory, Corbin was still bitter about the brutal campaign between Carter and Senator Ted Kennedy for the Democratic Party’s nomination, and out of spite he photocopied the debate prep book and delivered it to Bill Casey. This theory has its doubters, but is supported by the fact that Corbin visited Reagan’s campaign headquarters three times immediately before the debate.
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:14:25 GMT
Nixon’s PlumbersYou knew Richard Nixon would be on this list again. This entry deals with an infamous group known as the White House Plumbers, given the name because they fixed “leaks.” The Plumbers were composed largely of former CIA agents, whose activities were funded off-the-books by siphoning money from Nixon’s reelection campaign.
The Plumbers’ first jobs involved preventing leaks of classified documents regarding the administration’s foreign policy. The White House had been rocked by the revelation of the Pentagon Papers—a classified report leaked by State Department employee Daniel Ellsberg showing that Presidents had been lying about the Vietnam War since the days of Eisenhower. In retaliation, the White House ordered the Plumbers to break into the office of Ellsberg’s psychiatrist to find information that could discredit him. The Plumbers also conspired to burn the Brookings Institution, a center-left think tank, because the White House suspected that employees of the organization might be leaking classified State Department documents to the press.
But the Plumbers didn’t just fix leaks. As 1972 neared, the group began to expand their operations to include sabotaging Nixon’s political opponents. The group’s most famous act was the burglary of the Democratic National Committee’s headquarters at the Watergate office complex. Five of the Plumbers were arrested when an observant security guard noticed a strip of tape covering a door latch and called the police. The break-in ultimately led to Nixon’s downfall, as journalists and Congressional investigators continued to probe financial connections between the Watergate burglars and Nixon’s reelection committee and the White House responded by committing bribery, perjury, and obstruction to conceal the truth. The Plumbers’ dirty tricks ended up taking down Nixon rather than his opponents.President Nixon, The Plumbers and The Enemy List - Part 16 of 28
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:14:46 GMT
2002 Phone Jamming In New Hampshire Allen RaymondAllen Raymond discusses his book "How to Rig an Election," his political journey, and "dirty tricks" in campaigning.
Allen Raymond is a Republican political consultant in the United States who spent three months in federal prison for his role in the 2002 New Hampshire Senate election phone jamming scandal. He is also the author of How to Rig an Election: Confessions of a Republican Operative, a hilarious and candid personal account of his journey on the Republican side of the political scene. Leading into the 2002 mid-term elections, the Democrats held a one seat majority in the US Senate. Both parties fought tooth-and-nail to defend existing seats and pick up new ones, and perhaps nowhere was more heavily contested than the New Hampshire race between Democratic Governor Jeanne Sheehan and Republican Representative John Sununu.
As the election loomed, Sheehan and Sununu were running within a few percentage points of each other, which meant both sides’ “Get Out the Vote” operations on Election Day would make all the difference. The Democrats’ most important campaign was based around a series of phone banks run by the party and affiliated unions, who would call Sheehan’s supporters to make sure they got to the polls. But on the day of the election, the Democrats’ operations ground to a halt when their phone lines suspiciously went down. By the time the lines were back up, Sheehan’s campaign had lost crucial ground.
The police opened an investigation and uncovered a dirty trick that would land several local Republican officials in prison. Investigators learned that Chuck McGee, the director of the New Hampshire Republican Party, had collaborated with Republican strategist Allen Raymond to hire a telemarketing firm to jam the Democrats’ phone lines. McGee and Raymond were both convicted of conspiracy to commit telephone harassment and sentenced to several months in prison. The regional director of the Republican Party, James Tobin, was also indicted and convicted of conspiracy, but after the Republican Party spent more than $6 million on Tobin’s legal fees, his conviction was overturned on appeal.
As for the election, the phone jamming scheme helped Sununu squeak out a 19,000 vote win over his opponent. But Sheehan would stage a comeback in 2008, when she handily defeated Sununu in a rematch for the Senate seat.
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:15:14 GMT
Lee Atwater Lee Atwater was the dark master of the dirty trick and he more than deserves an entry all his own. He got his start in his home state of South Carolina, working on the 1978 Senate campaign for notorious segregationist Strom Thurmond. But it wasn’t until 1980 that Atwater’s cutthroat tactics truly came to the fore, when he served as campaign manager for Republican Congressman Floyd Spence in his race against Democrat Tom Turnipseed. Atwater discovered that Turnipseed had undergone electroconvulsive therapy as a teenager to treat a case of severe depression. From then on, when Atwater was asked about Turnipseed at press conferences, he would reply, “I’m not in the habit of responding to people that were hooked up to jumper cables.” Turnipseed tried to direct the focus to the policy differences between the candidates, but by then Atwater had caused enough voters to question Turnipseed’s mental health that he lost the race.
But Atwater’s most ruthless play—one that would ultimately earn him widespread condemnation from Republicans and Democrats—came when he managed George H.W. Bush’s 1998 presidential campaign. Bush’s Democratic opponent was Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis, and by the middle of 1988 Dukakis was polling a few points in the lead. It was then that Atwater decided the gloves needed to come off, leading to the infamous Willie Horton commercial.
While governor of Massachusetts, Dukakis had overseen a program that granted weekend furloughs to convicted felons. One of those felons, convicted murderer Willie Horton—who happened to be African-American—was on furlough when he raped a white woman and stabbed her boyfriend. Atwater worked with several outside groups to develop an ad about the furlough program that displayed Horton’s face immediately after an image of Dukakis. The racist overtones of the ad were so apparent that Atwater knew it would be political suicide for the Bush campaign to air it directly. Instead, he contacted several wealthy Republican donors to create a front group called the National Security Political Action Committee, which then “independently” aired the commercial. Atwater’s goal, in his own words, was to “make Willie Horton Dukakis’s running mate.”
When the ad aired, it had the desired effect of linking Horton with Dukakis in the minds of many voters, and when the inevitable charges of racism were leveled against the Bush campaign, they vehemently denied any connection to the ad. The Horton ad made it impossible for Dukakis to shake the label of being “soft on crime” and his campaign went into a death spiral. Come the election, he lost to Bush in a landslide.
Atwater was rewarded for his efforts by being made chairman of the Republican National Committee. However, after only a year in the position, he was stricken with incurable brain cancer. Before the cancer claimed him at age 40, he expressed regret for his ruthless tactics and even sent letters of apology to Turnipseed and Dukakis, though some former Atwater associates have questioned the sincerity of his remorse.The Willie Horton Ad and the Revolving Door Attack AdsSouth Carolina: A History Of Dirty Tricks | Long Story Short | NBC Newswww.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLt9mB9xb-rDpzss8AlPx0hB3p78a6Apqj
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:15:37 GMT
The John McCain Love-Child RumorIn early 2000, the top contenders for the Republican nomination for president were Governor George W. Bush of Texas and Senator John McCain of Arizona. Bush was better-funded and had the support of the Republican establishment, but McCain’s insurgent campaign had pulled off an upset during the first primary contest in New Hampshire, beating Bush by 19 points. The second primary would be held in South Carolina and if Bush lost there he would likely lose the nomination. Enter Bush’s top campaign strategist, Karl Rove, a man known for his take-no-prisoners approach to campaigning.
Rove’s weapon of choice against McCain would be a tried and tested dirty trick—the whisper campaign. A whisper campaign involves spreading a tawdry or malicious rumor about your opponent—while making sure the rumors aren’t traceable to you. Two weeks before the election, pamphlets began appearing under windshields at candidate debates that used a picture of McCain with his adopted Bangladeshi daughter to allege that McCain had an illegitimate African-American daughter, a charge that could cost him votes in a state that had not entirely left behind its ugly history of segregation.
Next were the anonymous pollsters calling local Republicans and asking them if they would be more or less likely to vote for McCain if he were mentally unstable due to his time as a POW in Vietnam. McCain was so enraged by the vicious attacks that he confronted Bush in person to demand that he stop; when Bush denied responsibility for the smear campaign, McCain replied, “Don’t give me that s**t!” By Election Day, McCain had lost his lead and Bush won by 11 points. With no feasible path to the nomination, McCain dropped out of the race, but he never forgave Bush for the attacks on his family and wartime heroics.
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:15:59 GMT
Dirty tricks beget Dirty SecretsThe Dirty Secrets of George Bush: Blackmail, CIA Drug Smuggling and Trafficking (1988)The Medellín Cartel was an organized network of "drug suppliers and smugglers" originating in the city of Medellín, Colombia. More: www.amazon.com/gp/search?ie=U...
The drug cartel operated in Colombia, Bolivia, Peru, Central America, the United States, as well as Canada and Europe throughout the 1970s and 1980s. It was founded and run by Ochoa Vázquez brothers Jorge Luis, Juan David, and Fabio together with Pablo Escobar.
By 1993, the Colombian government, in collaboration with the Cali cartel, right-wing paramilitary groups, and the United States government, had successfully dismantled the cartel by imprisoning or assassinating its members.
Donald Phinney Gregg is a retired American politician, CIA employee, and ambassador.
Gregg worked for the CIA for 31 years, from 1951-1982. After graduating from high school he enlisted in the military and received training as a cryptanalyst. He then attended Williams College, in Williamstown, MA, until 1951. Upon his graduation, he was recruited by the CIA. After serving in the agency for 31 years, Gregg was national security advisor to U.S. Vice President George H. W. Bush, United States Ambassador to Korea (1989--1993), and the chairman of the board of The Korea Society, where he called for greater engagement with North Korea. In September 2009, Gregg retired to the role of chairman emeritus of The Korea Society and was replaced as chairman by Thomas C. Hubbard.
Gregg joined the CIA in 1951. (It is not known if Gregg worked in the Miami JM/WAVE office, as Webster Tarpley and Anton Chaitkin claim, or if he knew Bush from that time, when the latter was CEO of Zapata Corporation.) Gregg then served in Burma (1964--1966), Japan (1966--1969), and Vietnam (1970--1972). In Vietnam, he worked on the Phoenix Program, where he reported to Ted Shackley. (In 1976, when Bush was director of the CIA, Shackley became Bush's Associate Deputy Director for Operations, the third-highest post at the agency.)
A friend and associate of Bush, Gregg was involved with the Iran-Contra scandal from the inception. On March 17, 1983, Felix Rodriguez met with Gregg at the White House and presented his five-page proposal for the creation of a "Tactical Task Force" for the "pacification" efforts in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua. Gregg then recommended Rodriguez' plan to National Security Council adviser Robert McFarlane, with a secret one-page memo on "anti-guerrilla operations in Central America". This marked the beginning of US support for the Nicaraguan contras. In June, 1985, Gregg met with Rodriguez and U.S. Army Col. Jim Steele of the U.S. Military Group in El Salvador during the height of the guerrilla war. In December 1985 Rodriguez attended Bush's White House Christmas party and was introduced as an old friend of Gregg's. In January 1986 Rodriguez met with Gregg's deputy in Salvador. In May 1986 Rodriguez met with Gregg, Bush, and Oliver North in Bush's office. In August 1986 Gregg met with Rodriguez and Bush. (Gregg soon met with Alan Friers to support arms purchases from Rodriguez instead of Richard Secord.) John K. Singlaub warned North in September 1986 that too much contact with Rodriguez would be bad for the Administration.
Gregg's father was Abel J. Gregg of Washington, the national secretary of boys' work of the Young Men's Christian Association. His wife was Margaret Curry. Their daughter Lucy Steuart Gregg married the writer Christopher Buckley.
Félix Ismael Rodríguez Mendigutia (born 1941 in Havana, Cuba) is a former Central Intelligence Agency officer known for his involvement in the Bay of Pigs Invasion, in the interrogation and execution of Marxist revolutionary Che Guevara and his ties to George H. W. Bush during the Iran--Contra affair. He is Cuban of Spanish Basque ancestry.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Medell%C3%ADn_Cartel en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Donald_Gregg en.wikipedia.org/wiki/F%C3%A9lix_Rodr%C3%ADguez_(soldier)
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:16:23 GMT
Dirty Tricks in American Politics: Vote Stealing, Ads, Bribery and Blackmail (1992)Published on Nov 5, 2014 Dirty tricks are unethical, duplicitous, slanderous or illegal tactics employed to destroy or diminish the effectiveness of political or business opponents. The term "dirty trick" can also be used to refer to an underhanded technique to get ahead of an opponent (such as sabotage or disregarding rules of engagement).
As a result of post-Watergate reform legislation, such activities are strictly regulated, though other private entities still may practice what has become commonly referred to as questionable or unethical dirty tricks.
Recent nomenclature equates a Dirty Tricks Squad to any organized, covert attempt to besmirch the credibility or reputation of an individual or organization so as to render them ineffective.
U.S. law professor and author of the book Dog Whistle Politics Ian Haney-Lopez described Ronald Reagan as "blowing a dog whistle" when Reagan told stories about "Cadillac-driving "welfare queens" and "strapping young bucks" buying T-bone steaks with food stamps" while campaigning for the presidency.[18]
Journalist Craig Unger wrote that President George W. Bush and Karl Rove used coded "dog-whistle" language in political campaigning, delivering one message to the overall electorate while at the same time delivering quite a different message to a targeted evangelical Christian political base.[19] William Safire, in Safire's Political Dictionary, offered the example of Bush's criticism during the 2004 presidential campaign of the U.S. Supreme Court's 1857 Dred Scott decision denying the U. S. citizenship of any African American. To most listeners the criticism seemed innocuous, Safire wrote, but "sharp-eared observers" understood the remark to be a pointed reminder that Supreme Court decisions can be reversed, and a signal that, if re-elected, Bush might nominate to the Supreme Court a justice who would overturn Roe v. Wade.[10] This view is echoed in a 2004 Los Angeles Times article by Peter Wallsten.[20]
Economist Paul Krugman in The Conscience of a Liberal (2007) extensively discusses the subtle use of dog-whistle political rhetoric by William F. Buckley, Jr., Irving Kristol and Ronald Reagan in building the rightist "movement conservatism".
During the 2008 Democratic primaries, several writers criticized Hillary Clinton's campaign's reliance on code words and innuendo seemingly designed to frame Barack Obama's race as problematic, saying Obama was characterized by the Clinton campaign and its prominent supporters as anti-white due to his association with Reverend Jeremiah Wright, as only able to get black votes, as anti-patriotic, a drug user, possibly a drug seller, and married to an angry, ungrateful black woman.[21] Obama was himself accused of dog-whistling to African-American voters by using a blend of gestures, style and rhetoric, such as fist-bumps and walking with a "street lope," that carefully affirmed and underscored his black identity.[22][page needed]
In 2012, journalist Soledad O'Brien used the phrase 'dog whistle' to describe Tea Party Express representative Amy Kremer's accusation that President Barack Obama 'does not love America'.[23]
During the United States presidential election, 2012, conservative political commentator Ben Shapiro accused the Obama campaign of anti-Semitic dog whistling after campaign staffer Julianna Smoot stated in an email that Paul Ryan was "'making a pilgrimage' to Las Vegas to 'kiss the ring'" of Republican mega-donor Sheldon Adelson.[24] This was described as "a classic anti-Semitic dog whistle signaling voters that Ryan is in the thrall of the 'Israel Lobby'."[25]
During the United States Senate Republican primary election in Mississippi, 2014, one of the familiar "code words" in many of these[26] pro-Cochran ads is the use of the "food stamps"[27] dog whistle. "Racist Radio Address to Blacks Saying Tea Party Will Steal Your Food Stamps"
After the fallout of the primary election, Ed Martin, chairman of the Missouri Republican Party, wrote an op-ed calling for the censure of Henry Barbour for his role in the funding [28] of race-based ads, as well as the censure of "any Republicans who were involved in the racist ads." [29] He also called to censure Barbour at an RNC summer meeting in Chicago.[30] Henry Barbour is the nephew of former Mississippi Governor Haley Barbour. According to this F.E.C. filing[31] the Cochran-affiliated super PAC "All Citizens for Mississippi" that played the Race card during the primary[32]was funded by another super PAC, "Mississippi Conservatives", which is affiliated with Former Governor Haley Barbour.
Senator Ted Cruz appeared on the Mark Levin Show to discuss the Mississippi Primary. He called for an investigation,[33] saying that "the ads they ran were racially-charged false attacks".
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:16:46 GMT
TRADING ARMS FOR HOSTAGES PRE-ELECTION The Secret Deal with Iran to Trade Arms for Hostages: October Surprise and Ronald Reagan (1991)
Published on May 11, 2014 In the 1980 presidential election, Republican challenger Ronald Reagan feared that a last-minute deal to release American hostages held in Iran might earn incumbent Jimmy Carter enough votes to win re-election. About the book: www.amazon.com/gp/product/0812919890/ref=as_li_tl?ie=UTF8&camp=1789&creative=9325&creativeASIN=0812919890&linkCode=as2&tag=tra0c7-20&linkId=344b7b33311c5e8e17175e6bf94d1441
As it happened, in the days prior to the election, press coverage was consumed with the Iranian government's decision—and Carter's simultaneous announcement—that the hostages would not be released until after the election.
It was first written about in a Jack Anderson article in the Washington Post in the fall of 1980, in which he alleged that the Carter administration was preparing a major military operation in Iran for rescuing U.S. hostages in order to help him get reelected. Subsequent allegations surfaced against Reagan alleging that his team had impeded the hostage release to negate the potential boost to the Carter campaign.
After the release of the hostages on January 20, 1981, mere minutes after Reagan's inauguration, some charged that the Reagan campaign had made a secret deal with the Iranian government whereby the Iranians would hold the hostages until after Reagan was elected and inaugurated.
Gary Sick, member of the National Security council under Presidents Ford and Carter (before being relieved of his duties mere weeks into Reagan's term) made the accusation in a New York Times editorial in the run-up to the 1992 election. The initial bipartisan response from Congress was skeptical: House Democrats refused to authorize an inquiry, and Senate Republicans denied a $600,000 appropriation for a probe.
Eight former hostages also sent an open letter demanding an inquiry in 1991. In subsequent Congressional testimony, Sick said that the popular media had distorted and misrepresented the accusers, reducing them to "gross generalizations" and "generic conspiracy theorists." Sick penned a book on the subject and sold the movie rights to it for a reported $300,000. His sources and thesis were contested by a number of commentators on both sides of the aisle.
Bani-Sadr, the former President of Iran, has also stated "that the Reagan campaign struck a deal with Teheran to delay the release of the hostages in 1980," asserting that "by the month before the American Presidential election in November 1980, many in Iran's ruling circles were openly discussing the fact that a deal had been made between the Reagan campaign team and some Iranian religious leaders in which the hostages' release would be delayed until after the election so as to prevent President Carter's re-election" He repeated the charge in "My Turn to Speak: Iran, the Revolution & Secret Deals with the U.S."
Two separate congressional investigations looked into the charges, both concluding that there was no plan to seek to delay the hostages' release. At least three books have argued the case.
In American political jargon, an October surprise is a news event deliberately created to influence the outcome of an election, particularly one for the U.S. presidency. The reference to the month of October is because the date for national elections (as well as many state and local elections) occurs between November 2 and 8, and therefore events that take place in late October have greater potential to influence the decisions of prospective voters.
The term came into use shortly after the 1972 presidential election between Republican incumbent Richard Nixon and Democrat George McGovern, when the United States was in the fourth year of negotiations to end the very long and domestically divisive Vietnam War. On October 26, 1972, twelve days before the election on November 7, the United States' chief negotiator, the presidential National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger, appeared at a press conference held at the White House and announced, "We believe that peace is at hand".[1]
Nixon, despite having vowed to end the unpopular war during his presidential election campaign four years earlier, had failed to cease hostilities but significantly reduced American involvement, especially ground forces. Nixon was nevertheless already widely considered to be assured of an easy reelection victory against McGovern, but Kissinger's "peace is at hand" declaration may have increased Nixon's already high standing with the electorate. In the event, Nixon outpolled McGovern in every state except Massachusetts and achieved a 20-point lead in the nationwide popular vote. Remaining US ground forces were withdrawn in 1973, but US military involvement in Vietnam continued until 1975.
Since that election, the term "October surprise" has been used preemptively during campaign season by partisans of one side to discredit late-campaign news by the other side.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_surpriseOctober Surprise: News Events that Influence the Outcome of the U.S. Presidential Election
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:17:11 GMT
Nixon Sabotages The Paris Peace Talks 1968A callous political move that condemned thousands of American soldiers to death. By 1968 the Vietnam War had been in full swing for four years. In March, President Lyndon Johnson ordered a limit to US bombing of North Vietnam in order to open up peace talks. Nixon, who promised he had a secret plan to win the war, knew that any peace agreement concluded before the election would devastate his chances of winning the presidency. So Nixon decided to relay a secret message to the President of South Vietnam, Nguyen Van Thieu, claiming that he would secure a better deal for South Vietnam if he won the election. Thieu—who figured he had little to lose, since he could pursue a deal regardless of who won the election—backed out of the peace talks at the last minute.
President Johnson became aware of Nixon’s machinations when NSA wiretaps of South Vietnam’s US ambassador revealed the plot. Johnson was furious at what he considered Nixon’s traitorous actions but he was prevented from publicizing it for fear of alerting the South Vietnamese that their ambassador’s communications were being monitored. That doesn’t mean that Johnson just sat idly by—he used every backroom channel available to thwart Nixon. Johnson ordered the FBI to place Nixon’s campaign under surveillance and relayed the details of the plot to Democratic nominee Hubert Humphrey, so that his campaign could publicize Nixon’s treachery. However, Humphrey’s aides believed he would handily win the election, and the campaign saw no need to make the shocking accusation that a presidential candidate had engaged in treason.
Meanwhile, the Nixon campaign continued to berate the Democrats for failing to make any progress in resolving the Vietnam War. Nixon even had the gall to offer to travel to South Vietnam to get Thieu back to the negotiating table (we can only imagine how productive that meeting would have been). Nixon ultimately went on to win the election by less than one percent, at which point it turned out that his secret plan for peace in Vietnam was to intensify the US bombing campaign and to expand the war into neighboring Cambodia and Laos. In 1973, the US would reach a peace deal with North Vietnam under much of the same terms as those discussed in 1968. Over 22,000 American soldiers died in those five years, along with countless more Vietnamese, Cambodians, and Laotians—proof that sometimes dirty tricks can have a death toll attached to them. "This is Treason!" Lyndon Johnson Everett Dirksen Phone Call November 2 1968
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:17:37 GMT
Republiconservative ratfucker Scott Walker and his loser cronies doing everything they can to keep power and steal the next election for themselves. The GOP is foul in so many ways. Anti democratic and anti American. Just look at what happened during the mid-terms in Georgia as well. Trick after trick to steal that election by the GOP.Wisconsin Republicans Are Bending Over Backward to Make Sure the Midterm Election Doesn’t CountGQ Luke Darby,GQ 4 hours ago
Republicans don’t want “limited government”—they want government that voters can’t change.
One of the highlights of the midterm elections was the dethroning of Scott Walker, a man whose primary purpose as Wisconsin governor was to brand every teacher and public employee in his state as an evil leech. It was a big loss for the Koch brothers as well, who pumped nearly $2 million into Walker's re-election campaign. But the Republican-controlled state legislature doesn't plan to let governor-elect Tony Evers undo Walker's grievous damage without a fight. In fact, they don't plan to let him do it at all.
On Monday, in the first lame-duck session in Wisconsin in almost 10 years, the state GOP is preparing to pass sweeping legislation that would restrict the incoming Democratic governor before he even takes office, with Walker poised to sign away his office's powers on his way out the door. Per the Associated Press:
The bills up for a public hearing and committee vote Monday, setting the stage for legislative action Tuesday, would move the 2020 presidential primary to help a conservative Wisconsin Supreme Court justice, restrict early voting in way a federal court already disallowed and give the GOP-controlled Legislature the power to sidestep [Democratic Attorney General-elect Josh Kaul] in legal fights.
The moves give Republican Gov. Scott Walker, who leaves office on Jan. 7, one more chance to reshape state government before his term ends. While lame-duck sessions are common in Congress, they are unusual in Wisconsin. There hasn’t been one since 2010, when Democrats in power then tried unsuccessfully to approve union contracts before Walker took office.
Changing Wisconsin's presidential primary, when Democratic turnout is expected to be high, from April to March will likely mean lower voter turnout in a separate election for Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice Dan Kelly, appointed by Walker. By putting Kelly's vote on a separate day, Republicans give him a better chance of surviving. And of the state's 72 counties, 60 have said that they can't accommodate an extra election date.
Meanwhile, Republicans in Michigan are also pulling lame-duck-session tricks to get around voters. A referendum to raise the state's minimum wage looked likely to pass, until the state legislature approved a wage hike on their own, causing the referendum to be taken off the ballot. Now that the election is over, the state Republicans are rolling back their own law to lower the minimum wage and scale back paid sick leave.
If this all sounds familiar, that's because North Carolina attempted the same thing when voters finally kicked out Republican governor Pat McCrory. It was such a naked power grab that political scientist Andrew Reynolds cited it when he declared that, by objective measures, North Carolina was no longer functionally a democracy. Reynolds also cited gerrymandering and voter suppression, but the GOP attempts to quash the effects of elections after they don't go their way are also deeply insidious. It's the natural next step for a party that believes if you won't vote for them, then you shouldn't be allowed to vote.
Republicans understand the importance of locking down power at the state level, allowing them to mount coordinated attacks on federal civil rights protections via attorneys general or shut down cities attempting to pass local environmental regulations. And they don't want something as petty as democratic process and the will of the majority of voters to keep them from having that kind of power.
www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/wisconsin-republicans-bending-over-backward-162102289.htmlWisconsin Republicans forge ahead with power-stripping billsAssociated Press Scott Bauer, Associated Press,Associated Press 8 minutes ago
FILE - This combination of file photos shows Wisconsin Republican Gov. Scott Walker, left, and his Democratic challenger Tony Evers in the 2018 November general election. (Wisconsin State Journal via AP, File)
MADISON, Wis. (AP) -- Wisconsin Republicans moved quickly Monday with a rare lame-duck session that would change the 2020 presidential primary date and make sweeping changes to the duties of the governor and attorney general's offices.
The changes being sought would shift power to the GOP-controlled Legislature and allow outgoing Republican Gov. Scott Walker to make one last major mark on the state's political landscape after he lost re-election in November.
Republicans forged ahead despite threats of lawsuits, claims by Democratic Gov.-elect Tony Evers and others that they were trying to invalidate results of the November election and howls of protest from hundreds of people who showed up for a public hearing.
Angry opponents filled the hallways of the state Capitol, and the hearing room, banging on the doors and chanting "Respect our votes!" and "Shame!"
The protests, coming at the end of Walker's eight years in office, were reminiscent of tumult that came shortly after he took office in 2011 and moved to end collective bargaining powers for public sector unions.
Republican Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald downplayed concerns about what was being considered in the lame-duck session, saying "I don't think it's outrageous at all."
"But listen, I'm concerned," he said. "I think that governor-elect Evers is going to bring a liberal agenda to Wisconsin."
Fitzgerald wouldn't say whether there was enough support among Republicans for moving the 2020 presidential primary date, a change that would cost about $7 million and has drawn opposition from nearly every county election official.
Fitzgerald said last week that Republicans want to move the 2020 presidential primary, when Democratic turnout is expected to be high, so it won't be on the same date as an April election where Walker-appointed Supreme Court Justice Dan Kelly is on the ballot, thereby improving his chances of victory.
The state Elections Commission unanimously adopted a motion Monday declaring that the shift would be "extraordinarily difficult" and costly without additional funding. Commissioner Mark Thomsen, a Democratic appointee, called the plan "the biggest waste of money for a single person that I can think of" during discussion preceding the vote.
Fitzgerald and other Republican leaders said that changes to that proposal, and others including limiting early voting to two weeks before an election, were being considered and could be offered during floor debate Tuesday.
Similar limitations on early voting were found unconstitutional by a federal judge in 2016 and Democrats have threatened legal action again.
A news conference where Fitzgerald and other Republican leaders spoke was peppered with catcalls from protesters.
A Republican-controlled legislative committee planned to hold a public hearing for eight hours Monday, before taking votes late in the night to set up final approval in the Senate and Assembly on Tuesday.
The votes to pass the sweeping package of bills would come about a month before Evers is slated to take office.
Evers decried the lame-duck session — the first in Wisconsin in eight years — as an embarrassment and an attempt to invalidate the results of the November election where Democrats won every constitutional office, including governor and attorney general.
He vowed to fight it, saying lawsuits were being explored, and called on the people of Wisconsin to contact their legislators even as the bills were speeding through. They were just made public late Friday .
"It goes to the heart of what democracy is all about," Evers said at a Sunday news conference held at a Milwaukee law firm. "I think it's the wrong message, I think it is an embarrassment for the state and I think we can stop it."
The executive director of One Wisconsin Now, which filed the lawsuit challenging the previous attempt to limit early voting, said the Republican's latest effort shows they "refuse to accept the results of the 2018 elections" and are worried about large voter turnout.
About 565,000 people voted early in the November elections.
The last lame-duck session in Wisconsin was eight years ago, just before Walker took office, when Democrats tried unsuccessfully to approve union contracts.
Democratic lawmakers who sit on the committee holding the hearing Monday said the scope of the lame-duck session was unprecedented and a reaction to Democrats winning all statewide races in November.
"It's a power grab," said Democratic state Sen. Jon Erpenbach. "They lost and they're throwing a fit."
Erpenbach said expected legal challenges to what is passed could "grind things to a halt" in the Legislature for as much as a year.
Republicans have had majorities in the state Senate and Assembly since 2011, and worked with Walker the past eight years to pass a host of conservative priorities. Republicans will maintain their majorities in the Legislature next year when the Democratic Evers takes over.
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Associated Press writers Todd Richmond and Ivan Moreno contributed to this report.
___
Follow Scott Bauer on Twitter: twitter.com/sbauerAP
www.yahoo.com/news/wisconsin-republicans-forge-ahead-power-stripping-bills-044446141.html
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:18:06 GMT
Since Nixon, how many Republican dirty tricks can you list? I'm interested in compiling a comprehensive, historic listUpdate: Panda..you're amazing Thanks Follow 7 answers Report Abuse Answers Relevance Panda Best Answer: Well . . there are quite a few . . do you want only Presidential dirty tricks?
1. Phony Press Release - planting false stories about opponent 2. Attack opponent strengths with character assisination 3. Suppress the vote by making false phone calls 4. Spred misinformation 5. Write dirty letters, release embarrasing photos to press
Some actual dirty tricks:
1. 1972 Muskie sex letter sent by Republican who plead guilty for distributing and publishing letter
2. Republican Lee Atwater - the boogey man responsible for dirty tricks against Republican opponents in primaries (he attacked Bob Doles record in order for George Bush to win the primary). Atwater alone would leak misinformation to the press to embarrass and discredit opponents of his 'candidate'.
3. 1976 - Jimmy Carter character assisination by Republicans for admitting 'moments of lust' . .and the attack by a swimming rabbit.
4. 1980 - Republicans stole Jimmy Carters speech in order to prepare Reagan for debate.
5. Illegal arms sold to Iran (Republicans supplied weapons to a country now our enemy) in order to pay for covert operation in Nicaragua
6. 1986 - Karl Rove and the office 'bugging' press conference
7. 1988 - Willie Horton ads instigated by Lee Atwater. Rumors that Michael Dukakas was mentally ill and that his wife had once burned an American flag.
8. 1992 - Independent Ross Perot reports wiretapping and threats directed towards his daughter to publish nude pictures of her before her wedding . . Republican dirty tricks intended to prevent him from running for President.
9. Newt Gingrich and his bank scandal against Democrats which backfired on him when it was found that he was the one with 'bad checks'.
10. 1994 - Karl Rove runs a dirty campaign trick on incumbent Texas governor Ann Richards by spreading the lie that she was gay and her staff was dominated by lesbians.
11. 1997 - Republican operative Conservative Hit Man David Brock admits that the Clinton TrooperGate and Arkasas project was planted as a dirty trick to discredit Bill Clinton. In 1998 he apologized to Clinton. Blinded by the Right search.barnesandnoble.com/booksea...
12. GOP investigated Clintons cat, Socks to make sure that taxpayers were not footing the bill for the cats fan club. Lol. www.pensitoreview.com/2005/12/26/...
13. 2000 - Republican Karl Rove dirty tricks targeted John McCain calling him mentally unstable, a stoolie while a POW, and that he had fathered an illegitimate black child. Rove stole McCains email list to mail scandals and lies to supporters. He was discrediting McCain in order to promote Bush for the Presidency.
14. Al Gore attacked with misinformation about the invention of the Internet comment, the Buddhist temple incident, the planted untrue story that Al and Tipper were models for the movie, Love Story - Gore Myths - www.algoresupportcenter.com/goret...
15. Hillary Clinton is accused of calling an aide a derogatory name . . none of it true . .but spread by Fox news
16. Republicans in Michigan recruit phony candidates to run as Democrats
17. 2003 - Republicans Karl Rove and Scooter Libby are directly involved in 'outing' a CIA undercover operative, Valerie Plame as payback because her husband was critical of the Bush administration.
18. 2004 - Republican operatives spred misinformation about John Kerry's plans to ban the Bible. Character assisination and misinformation was also spred about his military career with Swift Boats during Vietnam.
19. Telephone harrassment traced to Republican dirty tricks and George Bush with plan to jam phone lines of Democrats calling to get out the vote on election day.
There are lots more. Lol.
A Tale of Political Dirty Tricks - 2002 www.nytimes.com/2008/01/01/opinion/01tue3.html
answers.yahoo.com/question/index;_ylt=Awr4xJyLCl1cGA8ACCFXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTEyZ2FsYmU0BGNvbG8DZ3ExBHBvcwMyBHZ0aWQDQjY2MzJfMQRzZWMDc3I-?qid=20081206111618AAunWdu&p=JIMMY%20DORE%20SPREADS%20MISINFORMATION
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:18:33 GMT
An attempt by a republiconservative aka ratfucker to shut Michael Cohen up.Republican Rep. Gaetz warns Cohen he will play rough at House hearing David Knowles 1 hour 28 minutes ago
Hours before his scheduled public testimony before the House Oversight Committee, Michael Cohen received a warning, of sorts, from Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., about what awaits him.
Gaetz’s taunt came after reports that Cohen, Donald Trump’s longtime attorney, plans to testify Wednesday that his former boss was involved in an illegal scheme to use campaign funds to pay off porn actress Stormy Daniels. Cohen pleaded guilty last year to charges related to the hush money scheme.
The hearing before the House Committee on Oversight and Reform is expected to be wide-ranging and to cover a number of topics that could be problematic for Trump.
The preview Gaetz offered of what he and other Republican members of the committee may bring up was cited by some political observers as highly improper and possibly illegal, under statutes that make it a crime to attempt to intimidate a witness in a federal proceeding.
Confronted on Capitol Hill shortly after he posted his tweet, Gaetz bristled at the suggestion his words might be considered witness tampering.
Lanny Davis, Cohen’s lawyer, called Gaetz’s warning “a new low” in American politics.
“We will not respond to Mr. Gaetz’s despicable lies and personal smears, except to say we trust that his colleagues in the House, both Republicans and Democrats, will repudiate his words and his conduct,” Davis said in a statement. “I also trust that his constituents will not appreciate that the congressmen has set a new low — which in today’s political culture is hard to imagine possible.”
In Vietnam this week for his meetings with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Trump is reportedly making time to watch Cohen testify.
In recent weeks, Trump has eased off his public comments about Cohen, who had been a frequent target on Twitter over his cooperation with investigators that could land the president in legal jeopardy.
White House press secretary Sarah Sanders echoed Trump’s assertion that Cohen couldn’t be trusted.
“Disgraced felon Michael Cohen is going to prison for lying to Congress and making other false statements,” Sanders said in a statement Tuesday. “Sadly, he will go before Congress this week and we can expect more of the same.”
Cohen is scheduled to begin serving a three-year sentence on May 6 for crimes including campaign finance violations stemming from the hush money payments to Daniels and former Playboy model Karen McDougal.
www.yahoo.com/news/republican-warns-michael-cohen-ahead-of-congressional-testimony-224304126.html
This is the idiot who continually makes an ass of himself:
Matt Gaetz Gets DESTROYED During Hearing, Then Lashes Out At Parkland Survivors
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Post by the Scribe on May 25, 2020 10:19:09 GMT
gaetz is an asshole threatening a witness . Our country has gone down the crapper with Mafioso trump..... Verified account @mattgaetz 7h7 hours ago More Hey @michaelcohen212 - Do your wife & father-in-law know about your girlfriends? Maybe tonight would be a good time for that chat. I wonder if she’ll remain faithful when you’re in prison. She’s about to learn a lot...
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